We wish you
every blessing for the Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel.We are enclosing a copy of the Circular
letter for Sr Marie of the Immaculate Heart, and thought we would update you on
the happenings in our community these past three month since she left us.

We are
pleased to let you know that our postulant Sr Katherine has been accepted to
begin her Novitiate.All going well, she
will receive the Carmelite Habit on 1st September 2012.Our two aspirants finished their “live-ins”
in the last few months, and are currently discerning God’s will.Please keep them all in your prayers.

As this
letter is being written, our grounds and trees are undergoing major
reconstruction, and chains saws, trucks and diggers (with operators attached)
are in full swing (along with those incredible, noisy machines that eat
trees).We are having our large grotto
area reconstructed, as it has been quite labour-intensive caring for the rock
garden.At the same time many trees have
provided a bit too much shade over the years, so need cutting back. All this even before the earthquake repairs
are in sight, but there is much everyday maintenance work to be done.

We had a
big snowfall in early June, much to the delight of Sr Mareta, to whom it was a
new experience.The rest of us would quite
happily never see snow again.One of the
huge macracarpas split under the weight of it, and fell on our enclosure
wall.The latter managed to stay up, in
spite of its officially precarious state.It is proving to be a bitterly cold winter, but fortunately we have a
good supply of wood and a woodburner.Also a very kind friend, concerned about the
cold, gave us each a fine, exquisitely woven, Alpaca rug. The soft black, grey
and brown designs blended beautifully in our Chapel as we wrapped ourselves in
them at prayer for extra warmth. Temperatures actually reached a record low in
Christchurch.

We were
blessed in April and May with talks on Edith Stein from Professor Benjamin
Gibbs, and a series of talks on the Year of Faith by Bishop Basil Meeking.Our reflections on the Foundations continue
each fortnight.We look forward to
August 24th, which will be the 450th Anniversary of the
Foundation of St Joseph’s Avila, where it all began.We are currently brainstorming ideas on how
to celebrate this jubilee.

Statues
continue to come and go.We migrate to
the kitchen (with its welcoming woodburner) for our evening recreation during
the winter months.There is a procession
each evening of statues in all states of disrepair on all manner of trolleys. On the occasions when we’ve had to have our
midday recreation there too, the Sister Cook has had to work around saints and martyrs
etc, as well as trolleys of paint, and hopefully ensure that the plaster
doesn’t accidentally end up in the cooking.The owners of all these statues are always very grateful to get them back
looking like new again.

We continue
to keep your communities and families in our prayers, especially all those who
are sick.Please remember all those in Christchurch and
further afield who are finding this very cold winter so trying, in their less than
adequate accommodation.